Calgary Marathon 2011

It took me two weeks to work myself up to writing this post. The marathon wasn't a terrible experience or anything, but it takes a while to assimilate and reflect.

E and I left for Calgary early on Saturday, May 28th. It's a 6+ hour drive from here, so we spent most of the day in the car. I tried to stick to a relatively decent diet high in carbohydrates, but the food choices along the road to Calgary from here leave something to be desired. I ended up with coffee and a muffin for breakfast, some pretzels for a snack, and a McDonald's junior chicken sandwich with a few fries for lunch.

We made it to Calgary without incident, picked up my race packet at the expo, and checked into our hotel by about 5PM. The hotel was near a bunch of chain restaurants, so we decided to walk to Chili's for dinner. I had pasta with blackened chicken for dinner. I'm pretty sure the sauce was some artery clogging concoction, but Chili's is not exactly known for its health food. At least it was high in carbohydrates.

I managed to get a good night's sleep even in the hotel. Since the race start was a 7AM, the alarm went off at 5. There was no parking near the race site, so we drove to a commuter lot and took the C train to the race start. Temperatures were in the single digits, so I was really glad that E was there so I could wear extra clothes to ditch when the race started.

Between the marathon, half marathon, 10K, and 5K races, there were close to 9,000 people racing. About 4,000 of us lined up for the start of the full and half marathons. With so many people, it took me close to 6 minutes to cross the start line.

The first few kilometers of the race ran along the access roads to the Calgary Zoo. Because we were on the road, we couldn't see into the many of the exhibits (the road runs behind the exhibits), but there was one rather large bird making a godawful noise at one point. I got passed somewhere around here by a guy that was attempting to run the full completely barefoot! (As an aside, he finished a few minutes before me, and E said he looked like he was in terrible pain after 26.2 miles.)

After leaving the zoo, the course headed toward the downtown area. There were tons of people cheering around there, which was really nice. We crossed the Bow River after about 10K, and the half marathoners made the turn to head back for the finish at about 12K. I was drinking so much that I had to pee at the 13K aid station. After I got back on the road, I had to run up the one big hill on the relatively flat Calgary course. It wasn't really too bad since it was only 100m of elevation gain over 1.5kms. As I crested the hill at around 15K, I saw the two men leading the marathon heading back towards the finish (they were at 32K).

The next 25K or so ran through various neighborhoods in the northwest part of Calgary. Honestly, the course was not all that interesting through here. My split at the half-marathon mark was 2:29ish (2:24ish corrected for start lag). I was feeling really good at this point. I had lots of energy because I was having no problems drinking gatorade at every aid station and eating gels every 45 minutes to an hour.

At around the 32K mark, I was starting to feel it in my legs. I was very close to running back down the big hill, which I thought would give my legs a break. I. have. never. been. so. wrong. in. my. life. I am a flatlander. I do not run hills on a regular basis. In fact, we don't even have a hill that would compare to the one in Calgary anywhere near Saskatoon. As such, that hill trashed my quads and IT bands. By the time I made it to the bottom, I was having a hard time convincing myself that my poor abused legs would make it the last 8K to the finish.

So, I struggled. I walked through aid stations. I ran the rest of the time, but at a VERY slow pace. The kilometers crawled by. The high temperature for the day was only 14-15C, but I started to get a little warm because the start was cool enough that I needed to wear tights and long sleeves. Overall, I was pretty miserable between 32 and 42K (20-26 miles). At the half marathon mark, I was pretty sure that I could finish in under 5 hours. I started to doubt I was going to make it.

After far too long, I rounded the last corner and the race finish came into view. I gave the last 200m my best effort, and crossed the finish line in 4 hours 57 minutes and change. E was waiting for me at the finish with a beautiful bouquet of flowers (they are still alive right now!).

For as terrible as I felt the last 10K, it was a good race. The first 32K were great. I finished. In under 5 hours. At this point, I'm not sure if it's something that I want to do again. If I were to run another, I think I would train at longer distances to avoid falling apart in the last 10K (my max distance was around 33K before the race).

I sort of expected to feel this big sense of accomplishment when I finished a marathon. That didn't happen. It wound up being just another epic adventure to check off the bucket list. And I'm okay with that.

(By the way, I am still nursing 4 black and blue toenails. I am hoping that they don't fall off!)